Weather Permitting
by mad half hour
Summary: Sometimes love hits us like a fist to the face. This is the case for Magnus Bane—very, very literally. Luckily, the guy who punched him is more than willing to nurse him back to health, but he never quite manages to leave afterward. Malec, Human AU
1. Flash Flood

: : : **Chapter** **One** : : :

: : : **Flash Flood** : : :

"I just don't understand why bad things happen to good people, Catarina."

Magnus enters his apartment like a hurricane slamming into an unsuspecting coastline: powerfully, loudly, and with awful, monumental rage. He strips items as he goes, dropping coat and shoes and car keys carelessly to the floor, until he's left in his tailored jeans and artfully color-splattered tee, cell jammed against his ear. Everything else he can collect later, when he feels up to functioning again.

From the other end of the line, Catarina makes a sound that is mysteriously similar to a snort. Magnus graciously allows that it could have just been because of a bad connection, or Catarina adjusting her phone. _"Are you sure we're still talking about you, Magnus?"_

"I'm a lovely person!" Magnus exclaims indignantly, quite the feat considering he's still awkwardly cradling the phone between his shoulder and the side of his tilted face. He fishes a tub of ice cream out of his freezer and slams it onto his kitchen counter like he's making a statement. "I still talk to you, don't I? Only someone truly kind-of-heart would continue to interact with a woman so determined to heap abuse on one of her oldest, dearest friends."

_"Oddly enough, I was under the impression that I was the nice one for tolerating years of harassment."_ Adjusting his hold on his phone with one hand and using the other to gather a spoon as well as his ice cream, Magnus marches into his living room fully stocked for a night of moping. He drops to the couch with a deep, self-pitying sigh.

Catarina asks, _"Seriously though, are you okay? I didn't think that the two of you have been going out for that long."_

"Had been," Magnus corrects automatically, wrenching open the tub of ice cream with perhaps a little more force than strictly required. "And you're right, we hadn't- we started dating two months ago. But does the amount of time we were together really matter? Things were going so well!"

_"Oh, Magnus…"_

"I thought what we had was _special_."

A beat of silence passes. _"…Really?"_ Her phone makes another noise as she moves it, perhaps the drag of her hair across the speaker. _"For a moment, you almost had me."_

"Just because it's a cliché phrase doesn't make it any less true," Magnus objects. He stabs his spoon into the ice cream with gusto, and takes a very generous bite. The taste of chocolate and cherries melts across his tongue, and he takes a moment to focus on its decadence instead of his single status. If nothing else, Magnus will always have ice cream.

Around his mouthful, he adds, "We spent almost every day together. We went shopping together. We assessed each other's wardrobes and offered helpful, only mildly scathing critique. We even did each other's makeup before our last date. I trusted her _with my face_, Catarina. It may have only been two months, but things were getting serious. Or at least, I thought things were."

_"You can't possibly mean that."_

"Of course I can!" Magnus says. He takes another bite of ice cream before he responds, feeling like he's on the losing side of a battle with a brick wall. "I'm more serious than 4 am on Black Friday."

_"Magnus, you barely knew her, and frankly, it sounds more like she was a friend than a girlfriend."_

"I may not have known her that well, but I could have. Now I never will." Magnus twirls his spoon despondently, watching stray drops of cherry drip back into the tub. Izzy would have flipped if she saw it. "It was the most promising relationship I've had in a long time, and…I'm going to miss her."

_"Do you want me to come over?"_ Catarina asks. Her voice carries a definite note of concerned sympathy now. Apparently, she'd finally decided that Magnus's morose attitude isn't false. It's about time she realizes the gravity of the situation. _"We can watch Teen Wolf and do each other's nails."_

In spite of the melancholic mood that's overtaken him, Magnus smiles. He knows for a fact that Catarina hates Teen Wolf, and she's definitely not the type to ogle attractive men for the hell of it. Mentally, he amends that maybe he has more than just the tub of Ben and Jerry's Cherry Garcia going for him right now.

"That's alright, darling. It's late, and I'd hate for you to risk public transport by yourself at this time of night over a bit of melodrama. I'll be fine. "

_"Are you sure? I can have Ragnor bring me over. He wouldn't mind."_

Ragnor most definitely would. The thought of his crabby ass getting pulled out of his house for an Emergency Girl's Night is almost enough to have Magnus agreeing. He sort of just wants to be alone right now, though, no matter how much he loves forcing Ragnor to interact with other human beings.

"I'm positive," Magnus says. "Your loving voice is more than enough to sooth my fractured heart and tattered soul."

Even miles away and through a phone, Magnus can tell she's just rolled her eyes heavenward. _"So, you said you thought things were going well, right?"_

"Yes." Abruptly, Magnus is very grateful he hadn't put the ice cream away, even if it is starting to go soupy. Obviously, he'd better get on that. "Is there a reason you're verbally raking sandpaper over my very fresh, very raw wounds?"

_"Did Isabelle say why she was breaking up with you?"_ Catarina asks, completely ignoring him, as usual. The woman has all the blunt force and relentlessness of a wrecking ball. _"If you knew, it could at least give you some closure. Talking about things helps, you know."_

"She did." The skin of Magnus's fingers tug at the metal of his spoon, sticky and tight with chocolate-cherry residue. "Apparently, we're too alike."

_"What? Really?"_

"Yes, really." The tip of his spoon scraps against the bottom of the ice cream carton, and he shoves it aside in annoyance. Why does a pint have to be so small? It's not nearly enough to soothe the fathomless depth of his heartache. "According to Isabelle, we were _too_ compatible, and it would be weird to keep dating. Because getting along with your boyfriend is such a travesty."

_"Shit, I'm sorry, Magnus."_ She sounds guilty, which Magnus guesses stems from her making similar observations earlier.

"Don't worry your pretty little head, dearest," he says dismissively. The thought of Catarina being upset with herself, especially over something said between the two of them, nearly leaves him ill. Out of the peerless trio that is Magnus Bane, Ragnor Fell and Catarina Loss, only Magnus is allowed to be emotionally compromised. She and Ragnor are supposed to be the steady, immovable rocks to his unpredictable stream. It could also be the pint of ice cream he downed so hideously fast. Either way, he doesn't feel good. "You didn't know. Besides, I appreciate your blunt honesty. One of us has to tell it like it is, and it certainly can't be me."

Catarina laughs. _"Of course. You're lazy ass can hardly be bothered to face reality on the regular and Ragnor's too much of a pessimist."_

"Exactly! You're so good to us."

_"Speaking of, do you want me to rough her up a bit for you or something? What's a better use for a female friend than bypassing the 'guys can't hit girls' rule?"_

"I'm touched that you'd be willing to defend my honor, but that's not necessary. Besides," he adds, smiling fondly in recollection, "Isabelle could wipe the floor with you. I'm probably a foot taller than her and she could take me down." Though, in his own defense, he'd been all too willing.

_"Is that supposed to be an accomplishment? You're as skinny as a beanpole. I'm pretty sure I know middle schoolers who could take you out as long as they had a ladder to reach you."_

"Again with the insults? I'm emotionally compromised right now, Catarina- a delicate rose wilting away from ill-treatment. You can't handle me like a ruffian with gardening sheers. Your touch needs to be—"

Before Magnus can tell her just how she needs to improve her touch, there comes a sudden knock on the door. Considering people need to be buzzed into the building, it's startling and more than a little strange, though not entirely unprecedented. A few of the other residents have been known to get drunk and mistake his apartment for theirs.

_"What's up?"_ Catarina asks, curiosity probably piqued by Magnus's abrupt silence. He's not the sort to stop before he's said his piece.

"Someone's knocking on my door," Magnus says through a groan. He smacks a fist against one of his plush throw pillows half-heartedly, unwilling to get up but knowing he can't rest until he does. "I don't want to move, though."

_"Don't then,"_ Catarina suggests, voice the auditory equivalent of a careless shrug. _"If you ignore them, they'll probably take the hint and leave."_

As if to prove her wrong, the knocking ramps up into full-blown banging, forceful enough that Magnus can hear the door rattling in its frame. At this rate, one of his neighbors is going to complain to the landlord. The last thing Magnus wants or needs right now is to deal with a pissy landlord, especially one who curses the ground Magnus walks on. Jealousy can be so tragic.

"Shit, I'm gonna have to answer it." Getting up with all the willingness of a man headed for the gallows, Magnus restrains himself from kicking one of his end tables on the way to the door. It's newly refurbished, he reminds himself, completely by his own hand.

_"Why? It's not like they're going to break in."_

The next thud is so loud that Magnus is fairly certain the door was kicked. If he wasn't so opposed to bloodshed –too messy, too likely to disfigure people (read: himself), too exhausting— Magnus would probably open the door and punch the person in the face. Jesus, he repainted that door less than two weeks ago.

"Well, they certainly sound like they're trying," Magnus snaps. He probably shouldn't, because Catarina doesn't deserve his anger, but he's been through a bad enough night without having to deal with some drunk asshole too smashed to recognize a seven from a one. He'll apologize to her later, maybe take her out when he's feeling up to facing the world again.

_"Then you definitely shouldn't answer the door!"_ Catarina curses, which is followed by a vague crash in the background, like something was dropped.

"Don't worry mommy. I'm a big boy now. Besides, I have long-since perfected the art of handling drunks." Magnus peers through the eyehole and frowns.

The man on the other side of the door looks like some punk in his late teens, wearing more black than the average mourner at a wake. Normally he wouldn't associate himself with someone who wears the wardrobe equivalent of a sign reading "I'M A DRAG", but his straight black hair and pale skin strike a chord of familiarity. The man is scowling at the door like it looks familiar too, the sort of familiar that involves running into someone that once questioned his mother's virtue.

_"Magnus? You still there?"_

"Oh, yes, sorry dear. I was just distracted by my house-breaker's hair. It is awfully unkempt, I'll have you know. It must be from all the pantyhose he pulls over it."

_"Shut up, you ass! I'm concerned!"_

"Well, you don't need to be. I can handle myself," Magnus assures her. Another knock rocks the door again, the chain shaking in its bolt. "You should be more concerned for the kid outside. If he scuffs my door, Lord knows what I'll do to him."

_"What kid? I thought you said it was a drunk or something?"_

"I said I thought it was," Magnus corrects, unlatching the door's bolt. "Excuse me for a moment. I have to tell this brat to beat it before I decide to use his blood to repaint the door he's ruining."

_"Wait, Magnus! You don't even know who he is, and he seems angry. Be reasonable. Wait for him to leave, or…call the pol—"_

As with most of Catarina's advice, Magnus ignores whatever she's suggesting in favor of doing what he feels is best. In this case, he yanks to door open with a fierce scowl. "I don't know who you are, but if you think you can barge into this complex and start harassing me, you've got another thing coming!"

The kid clenches his fists, lips twisted into an ugly sneer. Which, really, is a shame—he looks like he'd have a nice face if he'd wear a more pleasant expression. "I'm here for my sister, you dick."

Magnus raises a brow. "What are you-?"

For a split-second, Magnus sees a flash of the man's blue eyes, as bright and beautiful as the sky right before the storm clouds roll in. Then he sees one of those clenched fists fly straight for his face.

The punch is a good one. Or, Magnus dazedly assumes it is. Surprisingly, he has never actually been punched before, no matter how often Ragnor, Catarina and dozens of other friends and acquaintances have threatened to. Pain and how to rate it, though: that, he is familiar with. It definitely hurts, blazing a shock of pain across his jaw that throbs its way up his cheek. It's the sort of pain that will mean bruising and swelling and cover-up for at least a week.

Instinctively, he stumbles back—one blow is always, always followed by another— and finds himself tripping over the pile of things he'd ditched in favor of wallowing and ice cream. One moment he's still on solid ground, flailing ineffectually to try to catch himself on something, and the next he's falling, gravity's newest bitch.

He has one moment to remember that there is a table behind him before his head connects with it. It's the newly refurbished one that goes perfectly with his new couch. He doubts he'll be able to get bloodstains out of the distressed grain of the wood. What a shame. All that effort wasted.

Then a bright burst of searing pain erupts behind his eyes, white-hot and blazing like a supernova in the darkness behind his lids. There are countless starts there, floating around in empty space.

"Oh fuck, a…kay?"

Distantly, Magnus registers a voice calling out to him as though from a great distance, followed by the weight of hands on his shoulders.

"I…so…king sor…"

They move to lift him and the stars scream in shrill, cosmic voices. He's pretty sure he vomits, and hopes that it's on the jackass's shoes. The guy keeps lifting though, and this time he swoons, his consciousness flung back past the stars dancing around him and into the blackness beyond their light.

: : : **Weather Advisory** : : :

: : : **Storm Warning Now In Effect** : : :

**A/N- This fic has a bunch of elements from ideas I've wanted to use in a story plot for several fandoms running, so I'm extremely excited to actually write it. The fact that I get to try my hand at a Magnus-centric POV is** **icing on the cake. Tell me what you think!**


	2. Strong Breeze

**: : : Chapter Two : : :**

**: : : Strong Breeze : : :**

Magnus is being stabbed through his eyes every time he blinks. Experimentally, he gives it one more try, and sharp pain lances through him to the back of his head, which is already throbbing incessantly. Closed eyes it is.

"No, no, no, please don't call the police!" someone is begging from somewhere above him. Magnus wonders who he could be, or why he's got his head cradled in his lap. Whoever he is, he must work out. He has excellent thighs in the places where they aren't oddly hard and lumpy. "I swear, I didn't mean for this to happen!"

"_What do you mean you didn't mean for this to happen_?" another voice all but roars. It sounds a little muffled, but recognizable. He'd think on it more, but Magnus's head is pounding to the beat of his ringing ears. "_You went to his apartment and attacked him!_"

"I just wanted to punch him for hurting my sister, not send him crashing into a table!"

Punching? Who got punched? And what table? If any of Magnus's good tables were destroyed, he would personally string the perpetrator up outside his window by their big toes and a pair of his old scarves.

The man shifts, and Magnus's world tilts, drawing out a moan of distress. Is the Earth supposed to do that? Or maybe his apartment isn't level. His landlord swore it was but what if it isn't and all his stuff shifts just a little bit every day? One day he'll go to put his keys down and they'll fall to the floor and that will be such a waste of time, especially if they just keep sliding away while he tries to catch them.

"Hey, wait, I think he's coming around." A hand taps hesitantly on his shoulder. "Uh, are you okay? Or well, obviously you aren't okay, I sort of made sure of that, but are you…up?"

"I'm up," he responds. Or tries to, anyway. His tongue is unwieldy and refuses to cooperate with him, so it ends up sounding more like "'mp". Normally, Magnus prides himself on his eloquence, but right now he can't bring himself to care.

"Okay, good. That's good." Magnus wonders if he's reassuring himself or the person he's talking to, whoever they are. "He's talking, so that's good, right?"

"_He's letting a complete stranger –who just punched him in the face and knocked him into unconsciousness— cradle a bag of frozen vegetables to the back of his head, and he isn't remotely disturbed or worried about it. DOES THAT SEEM OKAY TO YOU?_"

"Well, no, but—"

"You punched me?" Magnus manages to slur out. "Why'dja do that? What'd I do?" To his surprise, he feels about ready to cry at the thought. What could he have done to deserve this sort of treatment? What hellions did he get mixed up with tonight?

Beneath Magnus's head –and the bag of vegetables; now that they've been mentioned, he guesses his head does feel pretty cold— the man's (very nice) thighs tense. "You—"

"_You didn't do anything, sweetie_," the disembodied voice reassures him. She sounds nice, and he likes the things she says. "_Ragnor's already picked me up and we're on our way to your place now, okay?"_

Oh, he does know this voice!

"Catarina, that you?"

"_In the flesh, sweetie_." Lord, he must be really hurt if she's calling him that. The last time she called him sweetie was when…when… Well, it was the last time he was really hurt, anyway. "_Ragnor and I will be there in ten minutes, and we'll take you to the hospital._"

Magnus feels his breath stutter in his throat. "No hospitals," he argues.

"_Magnus, you were knocked unconscious for several minutes, and you can't even remember why. You have a stranger in your house and you've barely mentioned him, except to ask him why he hit you. We're taking you to the hospital_."

"Nooooooo," he moans as pitifully as he can manage. Maybe if he sounds upset enough she'll change her mind. "I'll make him leave if you want."

"I'm not leaving until I know you're okay," the man argues. Magnus ignores him. He punched him. He's allowed to.

"I will, I swear. Please, I hate them. You know I hate them."

"_I know Magnus, but you need to be looked over._"

"You're a nurse," he points out, though he knows it's futile. Catarina always gets what she wants, especially when she puts her mind to it. When it comes to the welfare of her friends –especially Magnus and Ragnor—she really, really puts her mind to it.

"_Yes, which means I know how serious head trauma is. You're going to the hospital, and that's final._"

"It's all your fault," Magnus accuses, reaching up a hand to slap blindly at the violent psychopath stupid enough to punch a good friend of Catarina Loss'. He hopes she'll let him watch what she decides to do with him. Maybe if he tells her he'd find it cathartic and emotionally releasing she'll at least consider it. Unlike Brutus St. Smash-a-Lot, Magnus misses his target, and all he accomplishes is sending his hand down pathetically onto his face. It really just isn't a fun accident at all. "Ow."

"_Did he hurt you again_?" Catarina asks accusingly, zeroing in on Magnus's cry of pain like the protective momma bear she is. It reminds him of when they were younger, right before she beat up anyone who made him cry.

"No!" the man cries out. Magnus notes that he is beginning to sound appropriately panicked, which is probably all the best for him. No one should face Catarina without an idea of how much they'll end up regretting it. It just isn't sensible. "He hurt himself trying to hurt me."

"I hurt myself 'cuz you must have moved away."

"Of course I moved away. I wasn't going to let you hit me."

If Magnus was willing to open his eyes, he would be glaring. As it is, he doesn't feel putting the guy in his place is worth the pain or the effort. "I let you hit me, _and_ I let you throw me into a table. The least you could do is repay the favor."

"I didn't throw you into a table!" the man protests, voice pitched high with distress. "And no, you didn't _let_ me punch you. You weren't even expecting it."

"I wasn't? " Magnus's brows furrow. He couldn't remember what happened, but he thought for sure he'd done something to warrant the assault. It wouldn't have been the first time he's driven someone to the point of violent rage. Although, it was the first time someone actually followed those feelings through to their natural conclusion. "What kind of heartless ruffian are you to attack a defenseless man in his own home? Do you touch your lovers with those blood-stained fists you call hands?"

"I'm not a—ugh, you know what? Never mind. Think what you want. I feel bad about a lot of this, even if I didn't mean for it to happen—."

"_You punched him in the face, __**intentionally**__. What did you expect was going to happen?"_

"Not him falling into a table! I just wanted to…to get back at him for making my little sister cry."

"I didn't make any girl cry today," Magnus says, frowning at the thought. He hates making people cry almost as much as he hates crying himself. All it does is make people look blotchy and red-eyed and snot-nosed, and it destroys carefully applied layers of make-up. In other words, it makes people ugly. As a big proponent of beautification in all aspects of life, Magnus Bane avoids being the source of tears as much as possible. "Or, at least not intentionally. I can't help breaking hearts wherever I go."

It is immediately apparent this is the wrong thing to say, as the man's legs tremble with sudden tension beneath Magnus's head. The movement sends tiny but excruciating shivers of pain from the back of his skull, clear through his brain, all the way to his forehead. Biting him in retaliation comes to mind, but Magnus ignores the impulse. The last thing he wants is the taste of cheap denim in his mouth.

"So when you broke up with my sister or whatever it is you did, you just 'couldn't help it'?" The man's voice is as scorching as the desert sun. At least, Magnus gets the impression he wants to beat down on him like it. "If you weren't concussed I'd punch you again, you asshole."

"Whoa there," Magnus exclaims. "Whoa, whoa, whoa. Calm thyself. I meant that I'm hot. I'm not Dan Brown, and my words are not like _The DaVinci Code_. Please, stop trying to pick out secret, evil messages in what I say. I am hot. That's it."

"_Okay, I'm going to put your facial aesthetics aside for a moment_," Catarina interjects. "_This is way too much of a coincidence to ignore. Are you Isabelle Lightwood's brother?"_

"Yes! Who else would I be? Has he been dating other girls whose brothers might want to hurt him too?"

"_You're_ Alec?" Magnus asks, casting his mind back to discussions with Isabelle over Chinese take-out and sappy rom-coms. Neither of them had tended to talk about their parents much, but Isabelle always seemed to have something to say about her brothers. Once upon a time, Magnus had looked forward to meeting them. A punch to the face and a bout of unconsciousness had not been the rendezvous he'd envisioned in his mind. "Izzy said you were sweet!"

"Not to heartbreaking ex-boyfriends!"

"Why do you keep saying things like that?" Magnus demands, thrusting himself up onto his elbows. A sharp throb of pain sends him right back down, pulsing incessantly behind his eyes, while bile climbs a slow, burning path up the back of his throat. He swallows down the nausea and breathes in through his nose until he settles back into a state of general misery instead of full-blown agony.

"I keep saying it because you broke up with her!" Alec says, voice heated and carrying not even a fraction of the sweetness Izzy had promised. "I came home to her crying in the living room with a few of her girlfriends, talking about how much she hates things never working out for her."

"But…but I didn't break up with her," Magnus says, hoping he doesn't sound as lost and helpless to Alec as he does to himself. His head feels like it's filling up with water, the pressure building while all his thoughts slosh around, swirling past his fingers whenever he tries to scoop them out. "My relationship with Izzy was great. Why would I end something like that?"

To his horror, Magnus feels the burn of tears building up behind his eyelids. He bites the inside of his cheek to try to stave them off, and ignores the stab of pain as his teeth draw blood. What's a little more damage added to his extensive catalogue at this point?

"Wait, that can't be right," Alec says. He sounds just about as hurt and confused as Magnus feels. If it wasn't his fault Magnus is like this in the first place, he'd probably be feeling bad for him right now. Unfortunately for Alec, Magnus isn't a saint and rather likes putting his feelings before those of violent strangers. "Isabelle seemed so crushed. Why would she be like that if she was the one to break up with you? You must be lying—"

"_I suggest you shut up before I start counting every idiotic thing that escapes your mouth and pay them back, one by one, with a swift kick to the balls_," Catarina threatens, the sole angelic protector of Magnus's much-abused heart. Praise her holy light. "_We're parked, I'm on my way up, and I swear to God you better run fast, because my retribution will be so fierce the Old Testament will sound like a fairytale mothers read to their children at night."_

"You can't just threaten me like that and then hang up!" Alec shouts into the ensuing silence.

"Of course she can," Magnus says, and if his tone carries a hint of vindictive glee, well, he's the victim here. He's allowed to take pleasure in the pain of his badly dressed assailant. "Catarina has always, and will always, do exactly what she wants."

"Is she being serious?" Alec asks.

"Once, when we were in kindergarten, she spent her naptime super gluing LEGOs to the feet of a kid who kicked sand in my face during recess." Despite the twinge of his cheek, Magnus grins up at him wolfishly. "She is dead serious, and if she could do something that heartless as a kid, imagine what she can do now with access to the Internet and a debit card."

"How does gluing LEGOs to a person's foot constitute as 'heartless'?"

"Clearly you've never stepped barefoot onto a LEGO," Magnus says with the lofty air of someone half-conscious and not entirely in their right mind. "I'm pretty sure the ground in hell is paved with them."

"If you say so." Then Alec adds, "I only ever played with K'Nex when I was a kid," as though Magnus cares about how deprived he was when younger. If he's trying to call on Magnus's great capacity for sympathy, he's more out of touch with reality than Paris Hilton when she thought she could launch a successful singing career.

"I do," Magnus says around a yawn large enough and painful enough he fears something in his jaw has separated. But no, it's just the grievous injuries inflicted on his poor face flaring up again. Lovely. "Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to sleep."

With as much capacity for terrible, concussive violence as Alec is possessed of, it makes sense that even underneath the thawing bag of vegetables –Magnus really hopes it isn't the broccoli and cauliflower mix; he has plans for those—Alec's thighs are too firm and uncomfortable to sleep on. They're nice when you just want to touch or admire, but as far as versatility goes, they leave a lot to be desired. No functionality for pillowing at all.

"Hey, stop that," Alec scolds, poking his shoulder repeatedly. "Aren't people with concussions meant to stay awake?"

Magnus groans. "Leave me alone. Haven't you taken enough away from me today?"

"I haven't taken anything away from you."

"The perfection of my face, thus any time it will take to conceal what you did to my face," Magnus counters. "My evening, the peace of mind I have whenever I'm not in a hospital, my sense of security when in my own home, one of my tables from the sounds of it, the bag of vegetables you decided to use like an icepack—"

"Okay, I get it. You can stop now. Sorry for being concerned about you slipping into a coma."

"You should be more concerned about yourself," Magnus points out, snuggling into Alec's lap. It's getting gradually more comfortable, the way beds do as a person gets more and more tired. Magnus still doesn't forgive him though. "If I were you, I would leave while I had legs to escape with. You won't get very far with the stumps Catarina will let you keep."

"I'm not leaving until I know you're in safe hands," Alec insists.

"How nice," Magnus slurs into the soft fabric of his well-worn pants. "With some anger management courses and a little common sense, we may be able to make a decent person out of you yet."

Exhaustion is drifting across Magnus's consciousness like a creeping fog, thick and obscuring. Magnus is pretty sure he hadn't felt nearly this tired only a few minutes ago, but can't bring himself to feel concerned. It's probably just another head injury thingy. He'd rather be sleeping when he got to the hospital anyway.

"You really shouldn't sleep."

"Just give me a pillow and get out of here," Magnus sighs, flopping his hand around in what could at least resemble a careless wave's distant relative. "After I get back from the hospital, I really don't want to have to find a way to remove bloodstains from hardwood flooring."

"I told you—"

"I know what you told me," Magnus says. "I'm not deaf. I just don't _care_. You're bothering me now, and I'm the victim here. You have to do what I say, and I say you should leave."

"Didn't you want your friend to get revenge on me, though?"

Magnus chuckles weakly. "It's cute that you think leaving now will mean you've escaped from Catarina for good. Even if this wasn't the twenty-first century, I know where you live. I dated," ugh, that past tense, "your sister, remember?"

Above him, Alec heaves a sigh that seems to pass through him for ages. "Fine. If you really want me gone, I'll go."

Magnus nods. "I really do. No offense, but you're technically trespassing, and harmed my favorite part of my body. The last thing I want is for one of my good friends to get sent to prison for murdering you slowly, as much as entertaining the thought makes me smile inside."

"Which pillow?"

"The lilac one."

Alec holds him up gently, but vertigo still sweeps through him with dangerous intensity. He's lowered down like something fragile, and his head meets with heavy cotton stuffing encased in slippery silk. That would be the lavender pillow from his couch. Honestly, some men have no sense of color at all.

"Are you sure you want me to leave?" Alec asks. "I still feel like ditching you is a dick move."

"One, it isn't ditching me if I've kicked you out of my apartment," Magnus begins, "and two, you cracked open my skull based on an assumption you never bothered to validate. I think you've already reached maximum capacity as far as dickishness goes."

"Your skull wasn't cracked open," Alec points out feebly.

"Meh, technicalities," Magnus says around another yawn. "Just go already."

For a moment, Magnus thinks Alec is going to stand around until Catarina bursts in and roundhouse kicks his head clear off for Magnus to use as a paper weight. It seems as though common sense wins out in the end, however, his footsteps carrying out into the entryway. Risking a quick peak, Magnus watches Alec's swift retreat, slipping out the front door and into the hallway.

If luck is on his side, he won't run into Catarina on his way down, or she won't recognize him. If it's not, Magnus won't exactly be crying about whatever retribution she brings down on him, anyway.

Shifting himself into a more comfortable position with a wince, Magnus lets himself doze off, thoughts lingering on broad shoulders brushing against a bright red doorframe.

: : : **Weather Advisory** : : :

**: : : Sustained Winds of 25-30 MPH Expected:**


End file.
